Every year on the second Wednesday in March, Liberians celebrate Decoration Day. On the national holiday, Liberians get the day off of work, and spend it at the cemetery cleaning and decorating the graves of their ancestors. Liberia’s 14-year civil war left at least 250,000 dead in a country of 3 million, so as you can imagine, most people here have many graves to decorate.
Yesterday I almost cried as Reverend Kumara, a Liberian man who sits at the desk across from mine, told me his plans of visiting the grave of his sixteen year old daughter who died two years ago from illness. Whether it's due to lack of decent medical care, or because of the senseless violence during the war, everyone here that I have met so far has lost someone.
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